If there's one thing Delhi-born designer Ashish Gupta is renowned for, it's delivering the unexpected.
At last year's unveiling of his SS16 collection on the final day of London Fashion Week, he treated the fashion pack to the sight of a bevvy of female models skateboarding down the runway – their hair covered in glitter and sequins – while male models also strutted down the catwalk – hand in hand – wearing slip dresses and heels, before twerking to the uproar of applause and cheers from the crowd.
Of course, his Indian-inspired SS17 fashion show during London Fashion Week in September was an unmissable spectacle in the latest fashion calendar, with models seen walking beneath a runway of twinkling fairy lights, dressed in intricately embroiled saris, churidars and lungis, and a live snake coiled around the neck of one brave model.
But, when the lights went up and Ashish came to take his bow in front of his adoring fashion fans, what caught the crowd's eye most was his T-shirt that read 'Immigrant' – a conscious fashion statement that celebrated his Indian and British culture, following the summer's surprising Brexit result and the rise in racially motivated hate crimes.
In an interview with Refinery 29, the designer admitted people's reaction to his T-shirt took him pleasantly by surprise.
'I was overwhelmed, it was good to know that there are so many people that supported me and that message.
Indeed, in just a week since the world learned that Donald Trump would be entering the Oval Office, amid concerns of rising racism, antisemitism and hate crimes aimed at minority groups on the streets of the US, it seems fitting that Ashish has added his 'Immigrant' T-shirt to his second T'aint collection, which launches at Browns this week.
*Adds to basket.*
Ashish's T'aint collection will be available at Browns from 18 November. Prices start from £70.
